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Looking Back: GCA Cybersecurity Toolkit for Small Business Turns One
Today marks the one-year anniversary of the launch of the Global Cyber Alliance (GCA) Cybersecurity Toolkit for Small Business!
Small businesses are the lifeblood of the global economy and making them safer addresses the grassroots of the supply chain. Small businesses consistently fall victim to cybercrime; the adoption of good cyber hygiene can often prevent them from becoming victims, but a lack of knowledge, budget, capability, and time often prohibits this. So, with the generous support of Mastercard, we developed the Cybersecurity Toolkit for Small Business to provide a go-to resource that includes operational tools that can make small businesses up to 85% less likely to suffer an attack.
“What sets the Global Cyber Alliance Cybersecurity Toolkit apart is that it is an action kit,” Philip Reitinger, GCA’s president and CEO, said at the launch of the toolkit on February 19th, 2019. “Our focus is on producing a dynamic clearinghouse of operational tools that help small and medium businesses address risk and improve their cybersecurity posture, leveraging the deep expertise of our network of global partners, such as Mastercard, and the experiences of actual GCA toolkit users.”
The purpose of the toolkit is to remove the barriers that so often stand in the way for small businesses by providing the knowledge, operational tools, and support structure to enable cyber hygiene best practice and adoption into the daily routine. It is not all easy, but it is critical, and through a dedicated forum we offer access to a broad spectrum of experts, practitioners, and other users to help along the way. It is also not just relevant for small businesses – the tools are all mapped to globally-recognized cybersecurity best practices, applicable to any size organization that touches the Internet.
But the launch of the small business toolkit last February was just the beginning. Since then, working with our colleagues and partners, we have added new tools; conducted hands-on, free, instructional workshops in the US and UK; developed and launched the Cybersecurity Toolkit for Elections through support from the Center for Internet Security and funding from Craig Newmark Philanthropies; and just last month introduced a French version of the small business toolkit in Lille, France. Not too bad for just one year’s worth of work!
2020 promises to be just as busy, with more languages in the pipeline, new training methods to reach more small businesses, and work with partners to address other sector-specific risks through the creation of specialized toolkits.
Earlier today, Philip Reitinger was on the GCA Community Forum answering questions. See what he had to say, and sign in to post your own questions and comments – we’d love to hear from you! https://community.globalcyberalliance.org/tags/c/general/GCANewsAnnouncements/70/interview
Finally, we’d like to thank everyone who has contributed to the success of the GCA Cybersecurity Toolkit for Small Business during its first year – we look forward to further collaboration, growth, and development during its second and subsequent years!
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